


take it slow, and it’ll work itself out fine

by spunknbite



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Blow Jobs, First Time, Frottage, Injury Recovery, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Orgasm Delay/Denial, dad bod richie, thirsty Eddie, unintentional edging over the course of months
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-02
Updated: 2020-03-02
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:50:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22977163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spunknbite/pseuds/spunknbite
Summary: Eddie didn’t want it to be about him for fucking once. He’d been poked and prodded and helped and supported, and Richie had held cups to his mouth in those earlier days when even lifting his arms seemed impossible, and now he just wanted todosomething, and not have it done to him.And fuck if he hadn’t been waiting long enough for Richie. Not just Richie, for the time when he could say,I want to jump this guy, and be okay with that; and this guy was Richie, and the time was now, and they were doing this, Goddamn it.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 72
Kudos: 941





	take it slow, and it’ll work itself out fine

**Author's Note:**

  * For [eurythmix](https://archiveofourown.org/users/eurythmix/gifts).



> You said _dad bod Richie_ and I went feral.

The first time they kissed — Eddie sleepy from the morphine, half convinced Richie was some sort of ecstatic, death-throes-induced hallucination — he’d thought in an opioid daze _I like that you’re so much bigger than me._

He liked that he had to lean up to meet him as Richie hovered over the hospital bed from the chair he’d been parked in for the better part of a week (although Eddie couldn’t have said at the time that it had been a week; or that Richie had only left the hospital when Mike had manhandled him out, insisting he needed a shower and rest in an actual bed and not the row of pushed-together chairs he’d stolen from the ICU waiting room; or that after being frogmarched back to the hotel, jittery that Bill wouldn’t text if Eddie’s blood pressure dropped again, Richie took a barely-adequate shower before skipping the nap entirely and returning back to his bedside; Eddie didn’t know any of that, only that every time he briefly woke up, the world around him oscillating and out-of-focus, the sole thing he was certain of was the Richie was next to him). 

He liked that as he started to tilt up to kiss him, Richie had stooped down in a kind of sheltering embrace so that Eddie wouldn’t jostle the staples keeping his chest together. Protective, almost. Hands so much larger than his own had cupped his face, and Eddie had thought _I like that you’re so much bigger than me_ , and then, _it feels safe_ _here_ as days-old scruff rubbed against his cheek.

It wasn’t just that Richie was bigger than he was. He was broader, sturdier, solid. There was a reassurance in his build, a promise. _A promise of what?_ Eddie hadn’t known, but he had believed in it, whatever it was.

 _Richie grew up_ , he thought, not for the first time since returning to Derry. Pronounced shoulders and deltoids atop deceptively muscular arms — a natural build because Eddie very much doubted Richie was hitting the gym with any regularity — and so much fucking hair everywhere. Up his arms and across his chest, peeking out from the haggard collar of an old t-shirt; over the backs of his hands and across his knuckles; sticking out in wires on his chin and cheeks.

The last time he’d seen Richie before _all of this_ , he’d been all gangly legs and sinew. Long limbs the product of a stretched-out, growth spurt that his weight hadn’t caught up to. Knobby knees, a gait that was still young despite being already over six feet. And even though only days before coming back to Derry Eddie wouldn’t have been able to spot Richie in a crowd, his recognition at the Jade had been immediate. _It’s you_ , he’d thought, _you grew the hell up_. He was borderline uncanny now, a little jarring; Richie inhabiting this grown-ass man’s body. The same stupid jokes and dumb voices and telling eyes, but now radiating a sort of authority that his size and age gifted. 

(And _Christ_ , Eddie wanted to kiss him because of it; because of the hard angles of his shoulders in contrast with the soft curves of his stomach under his t-shirt; because of his blunted, bitten nails; because of the sharp bob of his Adam’s apple every time he swallowed; because Eddie liked the image of having to arch forward on his toes to reach his mouth; because of the inherent masculinity of him, and _that_ was a thought Eddie needed to sit with.)

But morphine-musings were short-lived.

When Eddie slipped back under, too soon after the first kiss that started everything, it was to the feeling of Richie’s splayed fingers slotted between his own, covering the expanse of his hand with ease.

*

The second time they kissed — weeks later, Richie’s arm around Eddie’s shoulder, a hand steadying him as he helped Eddie sit up in bed for a glass of water — Eddie had looked over and saw the same eyes he recognized from childhood, their concern magnified behind over-sized lenses, and that had been enough to make him think _I should have been kissing you all this time_ , so he neglected the water in favor of Richie’s mouth, his dry lips insistent as Richie threaded fingers through Eddie’s bed-mussed hair.

Richie managed, “About fucking time,” and Eddie laughed. “Before, you were pretty drugged up. I shouldn’t have — ”

“Fuck off with that, Rich.”

Foreheads together, Eddie closed his eyes.

“I really thought you were going to die. I wasn’t thinking — ”

“I told you, stop it with that.”

Looking at Richie across from him, broad shoulders hunched down to meet Eddie’s height, eyes uncertain, Eddie took his big hand in his own again, and pressed close.

“I’m so fucking happy you’re alive,” Richie whispered, not like himself, quieter, and Eddie understood because he didn’t feel like himself either. Or perhaps, he felt more like himself than he had in years. He wasn’t sure.

*

“I should call Myra, explain this better than that non-explaination from before.”

It had been nothing, a delay, a postponement until Eddie knew what he was going to say; or rather, knew what he even wanted.

“Yeah, man.”

“I don’t know what to say.”

“ _Hey wifey, just thought I’d let you know I killed a demonic clown thing and I’m stuck in the hospital because my heroic actions saving this super hot dude almost got me killed. But I’m going to be fine, and by the way, I want a divorce.”_

“Yeah, that’ll go over great.”

*

Eddie was still on bed rest weeks later, the damage to his organs too expensive to risk a staple being popped from more movement than was absolutely necessary. And despite the jerry-rigged Netflix and PlayStation Richie had hooked up to the boxy hospital television through a series of newly-purchased, tangled HDMI cables connected to Richie’s laptop, Eddie was stir crazy.

“You pick the movie,” Richie said.

“What the fuck, man? I picked the last one.”

“You can pick this one, too.”

 _Fuck, this had to stop_. This demure, polite, _no-you-first_ bullshit attitude Richie had adopted. “Christ, I’m not dying anymore, Rich. Don’t fucking treat me like I’m some Make-A-Wish kid.”

Richie was still, then, “Yeah, yeah.” A shake of his head, and a conspiratorial eyebrow raise. “ _Die Hard_?”

“It’s not Christmas.”

“ _Die Hard_ is appropriate for all seasons, thank you.”

“It’s a Christmas movie.”

“You said it was my turn!”

“Fine.”

Richie unceremoniously hopped over the bed rail and there was a moment of uncertainty — a recollection of years of _close but not too close,_ a mutual chorus of _don’t let him know, don’t let him see_ — but then Richie eased over and under the blankets to join Eddie; a meeting of forearms and thighs as Richie draped himself cautiously over Eddie without interfering with the staples.

The night-shift nurses were more relaxed than the day ones— or maybe they’d just learned there was no point in trying to prevent Richie from getting into bed with Eddie when he’d only just hop back in once they left, like the delinquent shithead he’d always been — because they didn’t seem to care at this point, at least not beyond a look of mild annoyance. 

This closeness though. Skin against skin. Richie cocooned around him like a living blanket, like Eddie could just sink into the softness that was his stomach, be shielded and warmed up by strong arms that definitely shouldn’t belong to Richie Tozier, the asshole kid who once put a frog in Eddie’s hair.

And now tangled up with him — as much as his staples would allow anyway — Eddie pressed into his neck as Richie seemed to envelop him, arms and legs over Eddie’s like they were thirteen in the hammock again, and _Christ_ , it was simultaneously everything he’d wanted — always wanted, he remembered now, always fucking craved as a teenager but kept to himself out of a panicked fear of losing Richie — and yet it was also so insufficient, so lacking in comparison to what he needed now.

(It was difficult to process, this sudden need, urgent and reckless, to be close to Richie. He hadn’t felt anything like this in years, not since _before_ , not since his clammy hands had softened the crisp pages of comic books while Richie kicked him from the other side of the hammock, not since afternoon chemistry classes where Richie would look over at some other person with too much interest and the classroom around him would become slow and muted as every nerve in Eddie’s body vibrated with _no, look back at me._ )

The movie forgotten before it had barely begun, Eddie nosed Richie’s neck — _no, look back at me,_ an old refrain — leaving a hesitant kiss there, just below his jawline. Richie’s jaw tightened briefly under Eddie’s lips, as if unsure, and then Richie relaxed, bending down to kiss back, easy and open, like they’d rediscovered this after twenty-odd years.

“How much do you remember from before?” Richie had asked one evening after Bev and Ben went back to the hotel.

“Some things are still foggy.”

“We never — ?”

“I don’t think so, no.”

It was a nice idea though, that their first kiss hadn’t been a first kiss, but a continuation of something beautiful from _before_. Because what Eddie remembered most was a lot of fear and nerves, anxiety about his mom and Bowers and It, but maybe _this_ was something to reclaim. His memories didn’t support it, but it was nice to think that he’d spent time in Richie’s arms. 

Richie shifted down in the bed, angling himself to kiss deeper so that Eddie didn’t have to turn. A graze of teeth against open lips and Eddie hummed with need. “You okay?” Richie asked, a hand sliding over Eddie’s hospital gown, resting just next to the bandages that covered the staples.

“Yeah,” Eddie breathed, suddenly aware of how bare he was. Richie’s hands were whisper-light, like shadows of a firm touch, tentative in a way that wasn’t his as fingers ghosted up Eddie’s arm and across his neck, and Eddie thought _no, touch me, really touch me_ , because Richie’s hands were made for touching. Long-fingered and calloused, generous in both size and temperament. Hands meant to explore, to work, to knead. So Eddie cupped Richie’s right palm and brought it to his hips, spread his fist out finger by finger so that they splayed over Eddie’s hip bone, pronounced beneath the thin fabric of the hospital gown. “Please,” Eddie said.

Richie made a noise that was almost feral, a choked _something_ in his throat, as his fingers finally pressed into Eddie’s flesh, squeezing like he was trying to hold himself there, to fasten his hands to Eddie’s body.

“I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You won’t,” Eddie answered too quickly, suddenly hot, like Richie’s hand anchored to his hip was a firebrand igniting him, and _fuck._ It was a familiar ache that pooled fast and intense in his lower stomach, a pulsing need for contact that lit up his mind with memories of teenage wet dreams and textbooks placed pointedly over his lap and the summer he realized the hammock was out of the question, and _fuck_ , he was _hard_. “You won’t,” he said again, hoarse.

Another kiss, Richie’s tongue against his, sloppy from the awkward angle, and Eddie’s hands slid up Richie’s chest — vast and firm beneath his cotton shirt, and so decidedly masculine that it was almost jolting — and Eddie bit back a moan because, _Christ_ , the stray thoughts he’d had about men before were nothing to this. (Stray thoughts? _Fuck, Kaspbrak you’re full of it._ More like compulsive fantasies every time he came home from the gym by his office, holed up in the ensuite shower fucking his fist to the weightlifting dudebros who hogged the overhead press.) Because this was _Richie,_ and Eddie was so gone already — cock stiff against his stomach, wet at the head and beating with the sort of dangerous want that he hadn’t felt since he was a teenager — and he thought he might shoot off if Richie so much as glanced it, and _fuck,_ he might have forgotten to breathe.

_Fucking breathe._

All of those _stray thoughts_ had been thoroughly hypothetical though, something he could dismiss and rationalize away, but _this_ , this was real. Richie was bent over him and breathing hard too, frame too large for his cramped corner of the bed, and Eddie wanted to pull him down on top of him so he could feel his full weight, even though that wasn’t possible with the staples meshed into his skin.

“Fuck, Eds,” and Richie’s voice was guttural, deep, as his hand rode down Eddie’s hip and under the hem of the hospital gown, wrapping around the muscles of his inner thigh. The reach of his touch was expansive — the amount of skin those long digits could cover, stretching up to lodge the pads of his fingers in Eddie’s quads — and still Eddie needed _more_.

“Richie,” Eddie moaned, bucking his hips up to prompt Richie further, and —

_Fuck fuck fuck._

A knife-edged pain across his upper abdomen, cutting and tearing, ripped staples, and Eddie’s breath hitched as his words turned into air, a gasped inhale.

Richie was out of the bed and yelling for a nurse before Eddie could even process what was happening beyond _pain._

_*_

“I’m so fucking sorry, Eds.”

“Not your fault, asshole. Stop apologizing.”

“You have enough morphine?”

“Yeah, yeah — ” He might have been slurring; he couldn’t tell. “ — I just really wanted...”

“There’s no rush. I’m not going anywhere.”

Eddie appreciated the sentiment, but still. _I’ve waited long enough for you_ , he thought. _I wasn’t sure before, but now I am._

*

“Come on, old man,” Richie said, steadying the walker.

Daily physical therapy. Daily walks around the running track of the hospital gym while being lapped by octogenarian hip replacement patients. Daily opportunities for Richie to wrap an arm around Eddie’s back to hold him upright when his legs buckled, and for Eddie to sink into the warmth of Richie’s flank pressed against his and appreciate just how long Richie’s arm span was, so comfortably draped over his back, above the worst of the staples there.

“I’m younger than you,” Eddie said half-heartedly as he shuffled forward, legs fixed and slow to respond beneath him.

“Can’t let you atrophy, _young man_.”

“Look at you, paying attention to the doctor.”

He leaned heavily on the walker and tried to lift his right leg, the tenser of the two, but it was leaden, unmoving until his knee gave out suddenly and he pitched forward into the walker —

But Richie had him, his arms tight around Eddie’s waist, hands large and lingering, curved into his sides like Eddie was some petite, waifish thing — which he wasn’t — and Eddie found himself leaning against Richie and not the walker. Richie held his free arm out and Eddie grabbed hold of it to steady himself, his weight wholly supported by Richie’s outstretched arm as he found his footing again. 

A flex of muscles under his fingers, and Eddie would have been at risk of blushing if he wasn’t flushed with exertion already.

Strong arms. Capable of holding him up. It was such a masculine conceit, such a _guy thing_. And that notion — _I’m attracted to him because he’s a dude_ — was so fresh and novel to admit to, to sit with and process; it was something he’d denied himself his entire Goddamn life, and a feverish thrill warmed his body at the idea of it now.

“Nearly to the bench,” Richie said, eyes soft behind his glasses. He took Eddie’s hand and placed it back on the handle of the walker. “Can’t let grandma back there beat us.”

*

Thighs pressed close on a lonely picnic table in the park across from the hospital at dusk, Richie’s hands in his hair, a whisper of “I’m so fucking lucky,” into Eddie’s ear that made him feel like he was split in two again, open and vulnerable but willingly, lovingly so; but that’s where it stopped. Halted kisses, interrupted hands.

“I’m off bed rest,” Eddie reminded him. “It’s closing up.”

“Don’t want to tear them,” Richie said, pulling away as Eddie tried to edge nearer. “ ‘cause I’m going to rock your world,” he added with a foppish head tilt, a mask for the obvious tension underneath his words. Eddie snorted anyway, fondly, at Rich doing his best.

Restraint had never suited Richie, and it didn’t now, but God the man was trying. And God, Eddie was desperate.

*

The thing about hospitals is that they aren’t inherently private places. Yeah, Eddie had his own room, but the nurses were in and out constantly, the doctors occasionally. Of course there was Richie and the other Losers — who had returned to their lives more or less, or returned as much as they were capable of after what happened in Derry; but still Mike was around wrapping up loose ends, and the others Skyped and flew in every now and then to check in — and on top of that he hadn’t even been given proper shower privileges because of a combination of the partial paralysis locking his legs up and the extent of his wounds, still healing beneath the staples. So limited alone time was just a given.

And then there was _Richie._

— Richie pulling the curtains shut in the evening, his triceps flexed, his shirt tugged up, hem raised over the top of his jeans and —

 _Fuck_ , Eddie thought, _I’m so fucked._

A soft stomach that swelled out just enough before tapering into subtle, buried v-lines, imbued with that sort of distinctly masculine weight that betrayed muscle underneath the cushion. Hips with the same substantial build that looked grippable, Eddie thought, perfect handholds. And _Christ_ , more of that Goddamn hair that covered his arms, except here — dense and dark and curled — it extended up past his navel, further than the rise of his shirt revealed.

It was just that Eddie had never been attracted to anyone like this before. The gym dudebros were fine for a quick jerk off, but he’d never looked at someone doing something so innocuous as closing curtains and thought _right now, please._ And fuck, he was half-hard at just the sight of a few inches of abdomen, like some prissy Victorian scandalized over ankles. _Can’t let Richie know about this shit, I’d never hear the end of it._ His cock twitched, bobbing up and filling out under his sweatpants at the idea of running his fingers through that coarse hair, feeling what must be the gentle give of Richie’s stomach before dipping lower, unzipping his jeans.

_My legs might be pretty busted, but my dick works fine, so hey I’ve got that going for me._

Lack of privacy or not, he did have a bathroom to sneak off too.

Eddie sat up — he could do that by himself now, small victories — and hobbled to the bathroom with his walker. Richie motioned to help him, but Eddie waved him off with a middle finger.

Door shut behind him, Eddie leaned against it, eyes closed. It wasn’t going to take long, he realized, pulling his cock out and skimming his thumb over the sensitive ridge of the head. It had been well over a month — too long spent watching the span of Richie’s shoulder blades and the way his thighs spread out when he sat on the edge of the bed; too long thinking about climbing onto those thighs and rolling his hips forward and _fuck_ — and he couldn’t wait any longer, hand unsteady as he reached down and cupped his balls, heavy, on the verge of swollen under his fingers.

Eddie bit his lip to keep quiet, and the idea that Richie was just in the next room was almost enough by itself; that he might hear, that he might _want_ to hear, that he might get off on hearing. No, he might open the door when he heard, take Eddie’s hand in his and pull him back into the suite, because _it’s been so long, why wait?_

He could imagine it: Richie maneuvering them both to the bed, discarding his shirt on the way, and the long planes of his back would flex, shoulder blades taut as he pulled off his t-shirt, and he’d turn to Eddie, and _yes_ , Eddie wanted to see his chest, comb his fingers through the hair that must cover it as Richie pulled him onto his lap on the bed.

He was leaking enough not to need lube, cock slick and barely touched as a stream of precum spurted eagerly out onto his stomach, and Eddie stroked himself once and twice, thinking of how Richie’s pecs would feel, how his nipples would be hard and responsive and if Eddie was sitting on Richie’s lap he could just bend down and run his tongue over —

Pain cut deep in his stomach as his muscles contracted, and he shakily pulled up his shirt to see his bandages. No blood.

_Slower, just go easy._

Head back, eyes closed again, he spread precum over the tip, grazing up and back again with only three fingers. Just enough contact, just a little more.

He could almost feel the solid weight of Richie beneath him, how easily he could be supported by him. And Richie would reach behind him, knead into his ass with searching fingers, prompting Eddie closer, _so fucking close,_ so that Eddie could rut up against his stomach —

A spasm, worse than before, and he was breathless from pain, not arousal. “Fuck,” he whispered, knocking his head into the door, still half-hard but softening fast, stomach tacky with precum. “Fuck.”

*

And if Eddie caught himself thinking about Richie a lot, even when they were in the same room together, it was both a relief and a frustration.

A relief because he couldn’t remember the last time he’d just been held in a way that was supportive without being smothering, enveloping without being all-consuming. 

A frustration because he was stuck in a hospital with staples across his chest, and there wasn’t much he could do about it. And _fuck_ , did Eddie want to do something about it.

Because he was done with being _stuck_ . Not just here, although here really fucking blew, but in general. It took being stabbed to recognize the inertia of his whole, pathetic life — Derry and his mom; Bowers who scared the shit out of him with every slur, every reason not to look at Richie, _keep your head down, don’t draw any attention to yourself_ ; the clown that terrorized him well after ‘89; perhaps worst of it though was forgetting it all and getting sucked right back into old patterns — and now when he could finally think and see and he knew what he wanted (he wanted a guy; a man, a tall, hairy dude he has to lean up to kiss named Richie who was the antithesis of the nice girl his mom had wanted him to marry), he was still fucking stuck and frustrated and humming with pent-up energy waiting to be spent.

*

Richie leaned over Eddie to grab water off of the nightstand, and the closeness was overwhelming. It was the suggestive feel of him across his body, like Richie could so easily swing a leg over Eddie’s hips to straddle him, press down on his pelvis so that Eddie could feel the pressure of his weight, and be trapped under those strong thighs.

_Fuck, man._

Eddie shifted his hips as Richie grabbed the water and backed off to his spot next to him. Deep breath, legs crossed, ache ignored as he settled back against Richie’s chest.

*

He dropped his cane — newly upgraded from the walker — on the linoleum tiles of the hallway as they walked to the vending machine, because regardless of how Richie had grown up into someone who looked like an adult, he still liked Hershey’s with movie marathons.

Richie reached down before Eddie could manage it. “Don’t fuck your knee up,” and _Christ_ , the man’s ass and the back of his thighs and how his shirt rode up to reveal the small of his back, and —

The only thing that kept Eddie from copping a feel was the fact that if he let go of the wall without his cane he’d probably fall on his ass and somehow pop a staple and then they’d be stuck here even longer.

*

Richie ducked out to help Mike pack up for Florida, and Eddie slipped a pillow between his legs the moment he shut the door behind him.

It had come to this, and Eddie was beyond caring. Pride gone, he was in a near-constant state of want; half-hard at so much as a glance of thighs, at the flex of Richie’s biceps as helped him in the gym — he was faster now, steadier, but the right leg was still stiff — and _fuck_ , the dreams. Waking up sweaty from a mix of arousal and pain, cock rigid and pulsing in his shorts while his staples bit into his skin from too much squirming; faraway, fading sensations he could almost feel, tingling against his lips and inner thighs, as the dream drifted off.

So _fuck it._ He rocked into the pillow, less a thrust than a rub, trying to keep his abdomen relaxed. The pillow — one of the good, down ones Richie ran out to buy because the hospital ones were shit — was soft and yielding, and it was so easy to imagine it was Richie stretched out under him.

Up on all fours, looking back at Eddie despite the awkward angle of his neck, eyes a shade darker as Eddie fucked between his thighs. Warm skin, lube-wet, and cushioned as Eddie pushed in further, bottoming out so that his cock nudged the underside of Richie’s balls — and fucking hell, he’d never wanted anything remotely like this before, hadn’t even considered it, but Richie’s thighs were thick and pliable — and Eddie would urge his legs closer together, tap Richie’s hips until until he squeezed his thighs fully closed so that Eddie was engulfed, hot and protected and rutting into the heat of Richie’s body.

Only micro-movements, grinding into the pillow so that the length of his cock skirted against the pilled fabric of his sweats, slippery with the precum he was already dripping.

“Rich,” Eddie panted into his hand. Almost there, just about, just a bit more, just a little more friction —

He bucked up and swore, clutching his abdomen as one of the staples pricked into his skin.

*

The staples came out on a Tuesday.

And yeah, he looked — well, he looked rough. In front of the mirror, in the fluorescent overhead lighting of the bathroom, his chest and back were still a mess of discolored, seemingly ever-bruised flesh, knit-together skin that dipped in along the wound line, and rubbery, half-formed keloid scars that the doctor assured would only thicken with time. Eddie traced over the widest section of the scar tissue that ran down his sternum, and the texture was off, rough and unfamiliar, like it didn’t belong to him.

But he also looked _alive_ , and when he rolled his back and stretched his arms up, it didn’t feel like little metallic shards were embedding themselves deeper into his skin. So net positive, definitely. Insecurity be damned, he could fucking move again, and that counted for a lot more than some vanity he never really possessed anyway. Still, he threw his shirt back on.

And discharge was imminent, _thank fuck_. Only a few more days and he’d be out, and he’d never missed New York so much in his life. They’d had time (so much time; too much time confined here, but too little time together) to figure out the logistics; new apartment procured, sight unseen, and Richie would help get him settled before flying back to L.A. to sort his own shit out. 

They’d make it work. After everything that had happened, they’d find a way. For now though, Eddie just needed a proper fucking shower and no more existential questions about _what next_.

He walked out of the bathroom to grab a towel from the closet — cane mostly unnecessary now except for long walks — and Richie was changing. Shirt off, rummaging through his duffel bag on the bed.

“I’m going to hit the laundromat. I’m out of — ”

Eddie caught his mouth before he could finish, hands curling around the nape of his neck and back of his head so that Richie had to stoop down to meet him even as Eddie pressed up.

And _fuck_ , Richie was usually pretty restrained in kissing after so many missteps with the staples, but Eddie wasn’t having it anymore, deepening the kiss immediately as Richie responded with a chuckle into his mouth as he closed the slight distance between them, finally chest to chest. Sturdy bearing, secure this close.

“Hey there,” Richie breathed into Eddie’s lips.

“Fuck, you look good.”

“You trying to make me blush, Kaspbrak?”

“More than that, I hope.”

Another kiss, wetter, edged with desperation as Eddie could barely process anything other than _finally_. It had been so fucking long and Richie looked too good to keep his hands off of; broad shoulders and strong deltoids, bare and somehow more exaggerated now without the cover of a shirt; pecs, soft but they betrayed bulk beneath like so much of Richie’s body; hair that spread across his chest and down his stomach in a guiding trail that disappeared into his jeans.

And Eddie didn’t know where to touch, didn’t know where to start, because he wanted _everything_ and he wanted it _now_ , and he was pretty sure if this didn’t happen immediately he’d implode from the sheer, vibrating want spreading throughout his body. Eddie settled his hand on Richie’s hips for now, sliding them up past the waistline of his jeans and onto the weight of his bare skin, sinking his fingers into the generous give there, like if he squeezed hard enough he just might persuade Richie to touch him back.

Because Richie’s hands were fluttering again — too gentle, too cautious for the stampeding asshole that was Richie fucking Tozier — and his fingers were light on Eddie’s shoulders, almost uncertain as they brushed up across Eddie’s collarbone and up against the receptive skin of his neck.

“Rich, what the fuck?”

“What?”

“The staples are out. I’m not fucking _delicate_ — ”

“I know you’re not!” Richie insisted.

“Then why the hell won’t you actually touch me?”

Richie nuzzled his hair from above. “I’m just freaked out, okay? Fuck, the last few months have been torture and I don’t want to do anything that’ll put you back here.”

Eddie grabbed his head and pulled him down again. A brutal kiss, teeth against lips; a nip, no, a bite, and Eddie sucked the tender spot on Richie's lower lip that he’d opened up. Persuasion, a demonstration. _I’m whole, I’m okay, I can take anything you can give me. I can give it too._

“I’m okay. I nearly died, but I’m okay,” Eddie said. “And I don’t think I’ve ever had good sex in my life, and fuck it if I’m not getting laid now.”

“Presumptuous,” Richie whispered with a smile.

“Come on, man.”

“Your chest — ”

“Is fine.”

“But your heart — ”

“Cleared by the cardiologist weeks ago. You know that.” He gripped Richie’s flanks again, less kindly than before. “Stop fucking fussing Rich, I can’t stand it.” He’d been fussed over enough his entire Goddamn life, and constantly for the last few months in the hospital, and he’d had it.

Richie still didn’t look convinced, trepidation lining his forehead and around his eyes.

 _Fuck_. 

If Richie wouldn’t touch him, fine. But this was happening one way or another. 

Eddie pushed Richie down on the side of the bed so he landed on his back width-wise across, legs over the edge, expression somewhere between surprise and anticipation.

“You have no idea how much I need this.”

“Think I might have some idea, Eds.” He was so hard already, a fucking hair trigger at this point, cock tenting his sweats as he climbed up on Richie to straddle him. “Careful,” he said, as Eddie settled.

Richie was substantial underneath him, steadfast, a grounding sort of weight, foundational; like he could bear the load of not only Eddie but all he carried with him.

“I’m fucking fine.”

“Just watch your knee — ”

Eddie shut him up with a kiss. Bending down over him, hands in Richie’s tousled hair, he could feel the spread of his body over the bed, and he thought _I’d like to be under him too_ , because he wanted everything, all at once, and with such an intensity that it was all just a muddled ball of need that he couldn’t separate out.

Richie’s chin was stubbled, and he kissed down it, lingering on his neck as the stubble tapered into smooth skin. Eddie sucked a patch dark, wetting and rewetting it with open kisses until Richie bore a fresh bruise just under his pronounced Adam’s apple, and Richie sighed, hand coming up to brush through his hair and linger on the back of his neck.

A lick along his collarbone, and Richie’s breath hitched. The authenticity of that sound — a sharp intake, hesitant as if he was holding back — it struck Eddie and he suddenly thought _I want to be the cause of that sound again and again. I want to know you completely so I can play you_ , _write fucking symphonies with your breath_ — and so he kissed under the collarbone next, exploring down.

“Eds, let me — ”

“No, no, I want to — ”

He didn’t want it to be about him, for fucking once. He’d been poked and prodded and helped and supported, and Richie had held cups to his mouth in those earlier days when even lifting his arms seemed impossible, and now he just wanted to _do_ something, and not have it done to him. And fuck if he hadn’t been waiting long enough for Richie. Not just Richie, for the time when he could say, _I want to jump this guy_ , and be okay with that; and this guy was Richie, and the time was now, and they were doing this, Goddamn it.

So he shifted down Richie’s body, mouth glancing over the hair on his chest — so foreign a sensation, the feel of short hair against his lips as he trailed down — and to air-pert nipples, dark against pale skin, partially obscured beneath curls.

But _hell_ , the noise Richie made when Eddie kissed the sensitive skin there — it must be sensitive, Eddie thought, given the stutter in Richie’s breathing — and Eddie nudged in closer, taking the nipple into his mouth with a gentle suck.

Rich was salty to the tongue, and he smelled like the body spray he used, some sort of woodsy, piney bullshit that didn’t really suit the perpetual indoor kid that he was, and yet had somehow become _right_ in the months Eddie had spent snuggled close, inhaling him.

Another suck, harder this time, a graze of teeth, and Richie swore, his hand tangling in Eddie’s hair again.

“Yeah?” Eddie asked, not waiting for an answer before he did it again.

“Shit, Eds.”

“You see my point now?”

“Yeah,” Richie agreed, straining up on his elbows to watch as Eddie kissed across his chest to his other nipple. 

He licked over him, swirling around the areola before flicking back to the nipple as Richie swore again.

“Come back up here,” Richie finally managed. “I want to — ”

“No, asshole, you lost your chance,” Eddie interrupted with a smile.

Richie blanched. “Come on.”

“My fucking turn.”

Eddie nosed the underside of his nipple, kissing down his chest and over padded ribs, fingers coming up to stroke through the hair that covered his navel, and then skim down lower into his jeans. And God, Richie was warm, the dip of his flesh a pillow under Eddie’s hands as he pressed against him.

He’d run out of space on the bed and couldn’t shimmy and further down, and reshuffling to lay on the bed properly just seemed like a lot of effort so —

“Man, be careful. Your knee.”

Eddie slinked off the bed and onto the cool floor, stretching his knee out gingerly as he pulled Richie’s hips to the edge with him.

“Throw me a pillow,” and Richie did.

Eye level with Richie’s crotch now, his jeans bulging almost obscenely, Eddie swallowed a roll of uncertainty, but he reached up to the zipper anyway. He _wanted_ this, wanted it in a way that was almost frightening, with an intensity that had been building without a fucking outlet. But face to, well, dick with it, it spiked his nerves. 

Zipper halfway down, he felt the flex of Richie’s cock in his boxers as he shifted his hips under Eddie’s touch, and the noise he made — _fuck,_ a relieved sigh that was too satisfied to be caused by anything Eddie was doing, surely — and _oh God_ , did Eddie want to hear it again.

Pants still half zipped, Eddie inched closer, kissing into the hip bones, padded and comfortable despite the hard lines beneath. 

“Wouldn’t have taken you for tease,” Rich breathed with a laugh, and Eddie looked up to find him flushed pink.

In response, Eddie nuzzled into Richie’s open fly, cheek against his covered cock, and Richie jerked under his boxers, straining to be closer. 

“I had to wait this long, asshole. You can manage a few more minutes.”

“Eds,” Richie sighed then sat up a bit. “It’s the middle of the day, maybe we should stop until the nurses are less likely to — ”

 _Fuck more waiting_.

He could feel the curve of him under his cheek, the heavy weight as it tapered and then flared around the head, and it was too easy to lean in and press his lips to the underside of his head, tongue over the ridges even through the boxers, and Richie swore, bucking up. Even with the sensation blunted by the fabric, Richie was so fucking responsive, and it only spurred him on despite the lingering nerves, so he nosed closer to the very tip where he could feel the dip of Richie’s slit, and he licked into it.

“You sure you want to wait?” he asked, doing his best to convey bullshit innocence even though he was breathing just as hard as Richie.

Richie only moaned as Eddie licked over the head again, firmer this time, with more pressure over the frenulum. He shuddered under Eddie’s touch, hand to mouth to muffle another moan as Eddie watched him eye the shut door.

Kisses up and over the head again, cock bobbing under the fabric. Eddie lapped over the waistband of his briefs, into the soft underside of Richie’s stomach, leaving wet, open kisses, and it seemed so intimate, this simple act, even with Richie’s cock hard and nodding up between them.

 _Fuck nerves. Fuck waiting. Fuck indecision._ He was done with all that.

Fingers back to the zipper, Eddie pulled it the remaining way down, tugging at the snug fit of the jeans over Richie’s hips so that he could pull them off and discard them on the floor.

And the man’s thighs — _Christ_ , they were thicker than they seemed in his jeans, weighty and threaded with dark hair, and perfect for sitting on and _riding_ , and that thought was almost too much to focus on — so Eddie nudged then apart so he could settle fully between them, secure. Starting at Richie’s knee, he kissed up the inside of his quads, rougher than he’d intended, buoyed on by Richie’s breathing. A hard suck, a nip, and Richie bucked up under his hands.

God, the way he pressed in on Eddie, thighs pushing against his face as Eddie edged further up, tonguing his inner thighs, approaching his briefs. “You’re going to kill me, man,” Richie said, voice hoarse like he’d been shouting when he’d barely raised his voice past a whisper since Eddie had pushed him onto the bed.

The fabric of Richie’s boxers dug into his legs at the hem, creating a slight indent into his skin there, a soft pink line Eddie traced with his lips and tugged at the edges of. And looking at Richie — red in the face, glasses askew, bottom lip bitten from some combination of Eddie’s earlier ministrations and the his teeth chewing it now — Eddie wanted not just more, but _all_ of it, _everything_ , every possible thing Richie would give him. Eddie was half gone at just the sight of him, the notion that Richie was this worked up over so little, and that perhaps it wasn’t even because of the little that they had done, but because it was _Eddie_ who was the one doing it, and that was revelatory. His cock pressed up against his sweatpants, flexing to match the kisses and nips left on Richie’s thighs, and _fuck_ , it wasn’t going to take long, dripping already, untouched.

“Come back up here so I can touch you.”

“Not on your life. I’m where I want to be.”

Eddie pressed more kisses up his underwear-clad legs and across his pelvis to his cock, obvious and hard, and apparently dripping too given the smeared wet patches on the black cotton.

 _Maybe, just_ —

Richie moaned — too loud, throaty and desperate and halted as he bit down on his lip again — as Eddie sucked over the damp head through the fabric, past the thick ridges so that the whole head popped into his mouth.

He couldn’t wait anymore. He was barely holding on as it was. And even if he was nervous — which he was, uncertain and fluttering; the neediness of his arousal mixed with the trepidation of doing _this_ for the first time — but he was doing this with Richie, and in the face of that, his nerves seemed less significant.

_Sick of being passive and just waiting, sick of not having what I fucking want._

Eddie slid his hands under Richie’s hips and urged them up, slipping his boxers off and down his legs.

He was big like the rest of him, thick, a little veiny, with heavily flared ridges sticky with precum, and _fuck_ , Eddie’s cock bounced up as if wanting to get closer, and that idea — climbing up on Richie’s lap so he could just rub them off together — that was something to fucking remember for another time, but now, he needed —

Without hesitation, no lead-up or delay, Eddie popped him into his mouth, and the noise of it was obscene, a wet _smack_ of a mouth meeting swollen flesh, and Richie gasped, his hips bucking down as if he was nervous of gagging Eddie.

And it was sloppy and slippery and unskilled, because the number of blow jobs he’d given was precisely zero, and the number he had received was only a little higher, but _hell_ , it felt good in a way that he hadn’t imagined it could. A fullness as he pressed further in, sucking down another inch or two; it was heady and sensual, the throb of Richie’s pulse on his tongue — where the fuck should he even put his tongue? — and the flex of his hips under his hands as if Richie was just barely keeping himself under control.

Unsure yeah, but he was determined to get Richie to lose the control they’d been exercising for months, to make him see that Eddie wasn’t just someone to be fucking taken care of. He could _give_ him this.

A shuffle on the bed and Richie was propped back up on his elbows, and Eddie looked up to see him watching as Eddie rocked back and forth, sliding his tongue over the tip as he pulled off momentarily to readjust the angle. Their eyes met as Eddie slipped forward again, and the feeling of being watched, of Richie wanting to watch him like this, it was overwhelming, and his cock jerked up in his sweatpants, a spurt of precum soaking the front.

He set a rhythm, quick but not quick enough, a steady push and pull as he lapped over the head, tongue twisting over the sensitive glands with each thrust, and all the while Richie panted above him, breathing rapid and substantial somehow, deep and so very masculine that Eddie’s head swam from it as he inched closer, taking more of him with each thrust.

“You’re fucking incredible, you know that, right?”

Eddie only hummed in response.

“You’re a liar, too. No way you’ve never done this before.”

Not breaking the pace, he slipped a hand down Richie’s thighs and tentatively thumbed over his balls, heavy but taut, and he followed the seam back with his fingers, circling the knitted flesh with his thumb.

_Just a little closer._

His hand returned to Richie’s thigh, tapping him to urge his leg up and over his shoulder, and then the other one, and Richie moaned as Eddie was able to snuggle in closer.

The weight of Richie’s legs over him was overwhelming, how staunch he was and how protective they seemed; encompassing, encircling. But more than that was the realization that he could bear it, take it, support Richie without worry, that he could take him apart with just his mouth, and Richie could just lean into him and relax —

It was almost enough to send him over, cock borderline painful, aching and throbbing in time to his wild heartbeat, and Eddie squeezed himself through his sweatpants, hard, a restraining grip around the root of his cock as more precum spilled from the tip. Even just the gentle brush of the fabric over his cock was too much, hypersensitive and almost overstimulated from months of slow edging.

But not yet, not yet. He needed _this_ first, this control when he had fucking none for so long _._

Another inch then another, and he almost had all of Richie in his mouth, and it seemed so natural to just keep inching forward. He wanted to bottom out, take him in entirely to the very root, and there was spit dripping down his chin from just the attempt, like he could barely swallow anymore because of the sheer size of Richie’s cock, and that sensation — too much, too big, can’t swallow, can barely breathe — should have caused him to panic, but it did the very opposite, and Eddie forced the final inches in.

A gag, violent, visceral, and he pulled back, coughing as his throat seized.

Richie sat up, and was pushing off the bed when Eddie dug his nails into his thigh. “Don’t you fucking dare.”

“Eds?”

“I’m okay. I just need to catch my breath.”

“Just let me — ” Richie pushed up again to move to the floor, but Eddie held him to the bed.

“I’m fine, just got a little over ambitious.”

“Can I make a big dick joke now?”

“No.”

“You don’t have anything to prove, Eds.” 

“It’s not about fucking proving anything.” _Lies_. “I just need this, okay?”

He thought Richie might have understood from the look on his face; a gentle concern, an appreciation for needing to reclaim a part of yourself, and he said, “Okay.”

Breathing again, throat relaxed, he pushed Richie so he laid back, still on his elbows, legs over Eddie’s shoulders again. Eddie headbutted the inside curve of Richie’s thigh playfully and kissed a path back to his cock, before taking him in again.

A quick pace again, Eddie’s hand wrapped around the base of his cock as his lips met his knuckles with every thrust, and Richie’s hand returned to Eddie’s hair, absentmindedly tucking flyaway strands back into place as his breath grew ragged again.

Eddie pulled off, licked the tip once then twice, pressing his tongue along the slick slit, and Richie shuddered, rocking up.

“Yeah, do that,” Eddie whispered, cock pulsing at the idea of getting Richie so close that he’d just need to thrust like that, like he —

_Like he’d need to fuck my mouth._

“Don’t want to gag you again.”

“You won’t,” and Eddie squeezed the root of Richie’s cock again for emphasis. He slipped his other hand under Richie’s thigh, and urged him up again.

“Fuck,” Richie breathed, finally thrusting up, tentatively, barely there, so that the head of his cock slipped in and out of Eddie’s waiting mouth. 

“Yeah, yeah,” Eddie encouraged, not entirely aware that he was speaking out loud.

Richie rocked up again, firmer this time, and Eddie pressed forward with the thrust so that Richie’s length slid in save for what Eddie was holding, and _fuck_ , the bulk of it was reassuring, hard and solid in his mouth, a sort of pressure past his stretched lips that was base and primitive and fundamental. 

Another thrust and another, and Richie’s tempo was slower than Eddie’s before; deliberate and even, and Eddie relaxed his mouth as best as he could manage, letting Richie’s cock stroke over his tongue with every motion.

Again and again and again, and Eddie’s hips thrust involuntarily up too, hips rocking into nothing in time with Richie’s movements.

His mouth was almost numb, wet and open, and saliva drooled over his chin, and he should have been embarrassed by it, by the wanton desperation of it all, but he couldn’t muster it. It didn’t matter when he cock was this hard, right on edge of coming when he hadn’t even been touched; or when Richie was making these almost pained noises of need, blocked by his hand to his mouth, the other clutching Eddie’s hair with increasingly clenched fingers.

_I can take it. I can take it. I can take it._

“Going to come,” Richie managed, thrusting up again, pace abandoned to desperation as he rutted into Eddie’s mouth, and Eddie slipped his tongue over his head with every thrust, his hand squeezing his own cock again as it threatened to spill with Richie. “Fuck, Eds.”

His mouth, already so wet and saliva-drenched that it must be repulsive, messy and _used_ , was overrun by Richie. A last, battering push and Eddie pressed in, nose almost to Richie’s pelvis as his come hit his mouth, salty and bitter, and it _should_ have been disgusting, and Eddie _should_ have been horrified, but he wasn’t. He sucked him down, breathing heavily through his nose as Richie jerked up, and the satisfaction was catching, and even still hard and desperate, he felt _relieved_ in a way he hadn’t ever before, like a shaken up bottle erupting after months — longer, if he was honest with himself — of want. 

And there was a power to it. A gratification that it was because of him that Richie was panting and shaking and tugging Eddie’s hair, that he’d somehow both made and unmade him with nothing more than his mouth.

Richie had stopped pulling his hair, and instead had moved to his shoulder, urging Eddie up, and _fuck_ if that wasn’t all the encouragement he needed.

Up and on Richie’s lap, Richie shrugging Eddie’s shirt off with a sort of madness that Eddie felt too, he thought, while yanking his sweats down.

“Jesus, Eds.”

He was red, almost purple, cock so flushed it was bruised looking, straining hard against his stomach now that he was finally out of his pants, slick with so much precum that it could have been taken as lube, shiny and wet and dripping at a near-constant rate from the tip, and he needed — he just needed. _Needed what?_ It didn’t fucking matter as long as Richie was here.

Richie’s hands were everywhere and his mouth was on Eddie’s neck, sucking and biting, and _yes, finally — I’m not broken, I’m not, touch me, really touch me._ Thick digits dug into his waist, anchoring him there as Eddie rutted against Richie’s stomach, and this was fucking perfect, soft and cushioned against his needy cock as he pressed in again and again, and _fuck,_ almost. His precum soaked Richie’s curls, easing the way of his thrusting, erratic and frantic, and without any discernible rhythm or pace, just a frenzied thrust to the tune of _fuck_ and _now_.

Who initiated the kiss? It didn’t fucking matter; the only thing that mattered was Richie’s tongue was in his mouth, his teeth grazing his lips, and Eddie needed it, this consumed recklessness of fucking in a hospital bed, spit still slicking his chin, the taste of come on his mouth as Richie kissed it away like a man possessed, all the while fucking into Richie’s stomach.

The ridge of his cock caught into a soft fold, and Eddie pushed in again, seeking the give of his stomach as he glided up and down.

Richie’s hand squeezed his ass from behind, urging his hips forward so that he could really rock onto him. Another thrust, and another, and Richie’s other hand was wrapped around his cock jerking up, palm too big and sweaty and foreign and _yes_ , but he just wanted —

“No,” Eddie gasped, his voice cracked, throat sore and split. “Just want this,” and instead of backing off completely, Richie let go of his hold on his cock but cupped around it, cocooning it against his stomach.

The friction of it, of calloused fingers shielding his cock, holding him close against him so he could just rock and rock, and _fuck fuck fuck_.

Too much after so long, after fucking years of wanting and never having, of needing this intimacy and always denying it, and the sensation hit him suddenly, crashing like the momentum was so intense that it felt inevitable, like a sort of culmination of not only the past desperate months but of something from _before_ and _after_ and _all time_ , and he spilled hot and messy over Richie’s hand and stomach, spurting up over his chest too in thick white stripes like some kind of bad porno.

Diametric sensations: power and powerlessness, all rolled together in a mix of pleasure so profound it bordered on pain, and Eddie stiffened as the last crest of the orgasm rolled over him, before collapsing against Richie’s chest, head on his shoulder.

“Dude, you are — ”

“Don’t say it, Rich.”

“You’re a fucking sex God.”

“Christ.”

“No, I’m serious. I have your come on my glasses.” And _holy fuck_ , there was a pearly streak across one of Richie’s lenses. “That has to be some sort of distance record. We should consult — ”

“Guinness does not have records for that.”

“We could set it!” Eddie pulled off his glasses and tossed them over to the duffel bag on the other side of the bed.

Richie’s hands strayed to Eddie’s chest, over the scar, thick and pulpous and forgotten until Richie thumbed over it, tracing down his sternum with fingers no longer feather-light. A pointed touch, firm, like he was testing Eddie’s body, like he trusted him not to break under his hands.

“I know it’s bad — ”

“You look good, Eds.”

“You’re only saying that because you can’t see right now.”

“No, you do, you look good,” and he was sincere, Eddie knew, because Richie was sincere about most things, despite how he came off sometimes. A press of foreheads together and Richie reached around him, trailing his fingers down the scars on his back, across the deep crevasses and the stiff peaks, like he wanted to map him out, explore and memorize the geographical evidence of the surgeries. Proof that he made it out and was alive and wasn’t fucking breakable.

Eddie wasn’t a crier, and he wasn’t going to start now even if his eyes twinged, so he kissed Richie’s temple instead and said, “You’re disgusting and we both need a shower. Come on.”

**Author's Note:**

> Title taken from Guns N’ Roses’ _Patience_.
> 
> Talk to me on [Tumblr](https://spunknbite.tumblr.com/) and [Twitter](https://twitter.com/spunknbite).


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